Once more, a few hours later, my love and I were on the road as travelling companions, only now we were lovers instead of friends, and the companionship was, by God's mercy, to be for the length of our lives. And sweet it was to me, beyond all doubt, to have her by my side, to hear her soft voice in my ears, and to listen to the words of love that fell from her lips--sweet, too, to me to make reply to them.
For one thing also I was devoutly grateful, namely, that I had not hesitated to tell her that her father still lived; that he had yet, by heaven's grace, many years before him in which to expiate his past; that he had escaped the awful end to which he had been doomed, and which, during some few hours, she imagined he had suffered--devoutly grateful that I had done this, because, now, the sorrow which she felt for the erring man was chastened by the knowledge that it was not too late for him to repent and obtain pardon, and that his death, whatever it might be, could scarce be one of such horror as that from which he had escaped.
After some consideration I had decided that 'twould be best we should make our way to Oporto, where I thought 'twas very like we might find some ship for either England or Holland--perhaps, also, since the trade of that town with England is of such extreme importance, some vessel of war acting as convoy for the merchants. Moreover, the distance was not great in so small a land as this, and by the chart I carried seemed not to be more than thirty or forty leagues, though to compass them we should have to pass over mountains more than once. Yet the horses were fresh--I rode now my own on which Gramont had come and had then exchanged for the black one on which I had escaped, it having been prepared for me ere I took his place--the snow was hard as iron; it was not much to do. And, much or little, it had to be done.
And so we progressed, passing through Mirandella and Murca, striking at last a broad high road that ran straight for Oporto--scaling mountains sometimes, plunging sometimes into deep valleys and crossing streams over shaking wooden bridges that by their appearance seemed scarce strong enough to bear a child, yet over which we got in safety. And, though neither she nor I spoke our thoughts, I think, I know, that the same idea was ever present to her mind as to mine, the idea that we might ere long come upon some sign of her father. For, now and again, as she peered down upon the white track we followed, losing more than once the road, yet finding it again ere long, she would rein in the jennet and look at the tracks frozen in the snow, then shake her head mournfully as we went on once more.
But of Gramont we saw no sign--nor ever saw him again in this world.
Going on and on, however, we drew near as I judged, to the coast, still climbing the mountains and still passing at other times through the valleys, over all of which there lay the vast white pall burying everything beneath it.
We heard also the great river that is called the Douro, rolling and humming and swirling beneath the roof of frozen snow which, in some places, stretched across it from bank to bank. In some places, too, where the road we traversed approached nearer to the stream, we saw it cleaving its way through banks so narrowed by their coating of ice that it o'erleapt and foamed above the sides, while with a great swish, such as a huge tide makes upon a shingly beach, its waters spread out with a hissing splash from their eddies and swept over the borders on either side. Yet, because the way this river rushed was likewise our way to peace and happiness--the road toward the great sea we hoped so soon to traverse--we regarded it with interest.
"See," I said to Juana, as now we rode close to it, so that at this time our horses' feet were laved by its overflow, "see how it bears down with it great trees from far inland, from where we have come; also other things, the wooden roof of some peasant's hut, some household goods too. I fear it has swept over the country, has burst in places from its narrow frost-bound sides."
'Twas true--such must have happened--for even as I spoke, there went by the body of a horse--the creature's sides all torn and lacerated, doubtless by some narrow passage in which the spears of ice would be as sharp as swords' points; then, next--oh! piteous sight!--a little dead babe rolled over and over as the waves bore it along in their swift flight.
"Look, look," she murmured, pointing forward to where the river broadened, but out into the breadth of which there projected a spur, or tongue of land; "look! that catches much of what comes down--see! the dead horse's progress is stopped upon it--and Mervan, the little babe is also rolled on to that slip of land while there are many other things besides; more bodies of both men and animals."